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An official from the U.S. Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) weighed in on a state regulatory call today on the insurance regulatory system’s measures for combating money laundering and terrorist financing by saying much more works needs to be done.

The official, David Brummond, senior sanctions advisor with OFAC, said that the International Association of Insurance Supervisors (IAIS) revisions to Insurance Core Principle (ICP) 22 -- standards for a country’s anti-money laundering terrorism financing legislation -- need to reflect the fact that the property casualty sector is not well-represented in counterterrorism measures in the ICP.

OFAC administers and enforces economic and trade sanctions based on U.S. foreign policy and national security goals against targeted foreign countries and regimes, terrorists, international narcotics traffickers and other threats to the national security, foreign policy or economy of the United States.

The draft ICP section Brummond zeroed in on says that a supervisor is aware of and has an understanding of money laundering and terrorism financing risks to which insurers and intermediaries are exposed. It must liaise with and seek to obtain information from the designated competent authority relating to these risks by insurers and insurance intermediaries, the ICP section states.

Brummond said the approach of the ICP and the NAIC's work there "is very life insurance asset-based-oriented but not very property-casualty” industry-oriented, and most issues for counterterrorism have involved not the life insurance sector but property casualty. Brummond also said more standards work needs to be done on the counterterrorism front, not just the money-laundering front.

He said he looked forward to working with the NAIC and individual regulators to focus on these real concerns.

Brummond spoke on a call of the International Insurance Relations Committee of the National Association of Insurance Commissioners (NAIC), as chaired by Tom Leonardi, the Connecticut Insurance commissioner, who thanked Brummond and agreed to work with him on the identified issues of concern.

In other antiterrorism measures focused on the insurance industry, Treasury, under its Federal Insurance Office and the Office of Critical Infrastructure Protection will host a non-classified cybersecurity briefing for the insurance sector, inviting both industry and state regulators as well as NAIC staff on Aug. 22 via a Webcast.